Firms do not pay required licence fees, use fake certificates
12 arrested in Chinese drug scam
Chennai: The anti-corruption bureau of CBI, Chennai, on Monday arrested 12 persons, including four importers and customs house clearing agents, in connection with illegal import of Chinese drugs by evading drug registration and licence fees running into many crores of rupees.
A senior CBI official identified the arrested pharmaceutical drug importers as Ram Lal, Sanjay Kanvi, Sachin Jain and Sohan Chand. The arrested were produced in the CBI court on Monday and remanded in judicial custody.
The CBI had begun the investigation into the multi-crore scam last year. The probe was into import of pharmaceutical drugs by four firms in Chennai during 2011-12. The firms, while importing over 475 drugs from China with the connivance of customs officials in Chennai airport, had brought in the drugs without registering the drug names.
They had not paid the required licence fees and had used fake quality control certificates from the central drug control organisation. Every imported drug has to not only be registered with the drug control organisation by paying US$ 1,500 as registration fee but also needs to be obtained under licence after paying 1,000.
It was believed that the importers, in connivance with customs officials at the airport, had been importing the drugs even without giving details of chemicals. The customs officials would not refer the doubtful cases to the assistant drug control officer stationed at the airport.
During investigation, over 20 customs officials including assistant commissioners, appraisers and superintendents, came under the CBI scanner. The bureau had also raided offices and houses of some of the customs officers in 2013. However, the CBI had so far not arrested any customs official in connection with the scam.
“The probe is not yet over. We may make some more arrests soon,” a CBI official said. “This has not only caused major loss to the government exchequer, but had also put the health of people at risk by allowing drugs to be imported without even knowing what kind of chemicals are being dumped with Indian pharma companies from China,” a drug control official, who didn’t wanted to be named, said.
The CBI sources identified the drug importers involved in the scam as Hoewitzer Organic Chemicals, Antoine and Becouerel, Kawarlal & Co and D K Enterprises. Hoewitzer had imported 200 drugs from China by violating all norms while DK Enterprises had imported 160 drugs, Kawarlal & Co had bought 57 chemicals and Antoine and Becouerel, 33 drugs.
( Source : dc correspondent )
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